What is DickFlicks?

We love movies. Good movies, great movies, smart movies, even some truly awful movies. That’s the whole reason for this site — so we can rant and rave about movies with other people who love movies.

But have you ever noticed that most movies are stuffed full of guys with just the occasional girl thrown in? You’ll have the quarterback, the coach, and the leggy girlfriend. The rock star, the manager, and the spilling-out-of-her-halter groupie. The renegade cop/spy/SEAL and the perfect wife who dies in the first five minutes. The quirky scientist and the…. Okay, you don’t usually see that on the big screen.

So where are all the girls? Most women in the world are not just a voluptuous set of curves waiting for the chance to worry about or fawn over or get kissed by their man. And we’re on a mission to find these real girls on film. Because we’re sure (pretty sure, at least) they exist.

If you’ll note in the green box on the right, a dick flick is any flick which meets one of the following three criteria:

Less than 25% of the leading roles are female.

….and really, we stop there. Because it’s hard to find movies with just 1 out of 4 female lead characters. Add in #2 (less than 25% of the entire cast) or #3 (fewer than 25% of the lines going to girls), and most of Hollywood gets dumped into the ocean. Really. Try it.

Isn’t this the Bechdel Test, you ask? If you actually know that term, then you are a movie geek, and here’s why it’s not. But aren’t you just talking about chick flicks, you say? No. No, no, noooooo. We cannot emphasize this enough: Absolutely, uncategorically, no way in freakin’ h#?! no.

The objective here is not to judge, criticize, or ridicule Hollywood in its current state of Dick Flick-i-ness.

Okay, well, maybe it is a little.

But seriously, WE LOVE MOVIES. If they are good, or great, or pure cinematic perfection, gender doesn’t matter. Some of our favorite movies are dick flicks. And when the landscape of the cinema world reflects the general populace of the actual human world more closely, then we at DickFlicks will happily change our name to FlickFlicks, or just Flicks, or… Well, to something else catchy.

If you love movies, wander around our site for a bit. If you’re frustrated by the noticeable lack of girls in the cinema, check out what we’ve compiled or send us a suggestion for a Strong Female Lead. If you just wanna watch a movie, browse our ever-growing database of reviews (on the left) or find a warning on what to avoid.

But most of all, talk to us! Leave a comment or send a message. DickFlicks is an interactive community, and it’s going to take a lot to scour through a century of movies to find those girls on film. We want to know what movies you worship, what characters you despise, what else we should see, and why everything we say on this site is wrong (or right). So drop us a line!